Page 49 of Shadowed Bond

The healers insisted we both rest before we leave.

I told them we didn’t have time for that shit, but Leo wasn’t really any help either, and Ahren is pretty much holding us hostage. Although he said I could leave Charlotte and go, which I am obviously not going to do.

And what’s more fucking irritating is that she agreed that I could just go.

She did it with that infuriating calm voice, like she really didn’t give a fuck if I left or not. And she probably fucking knew I wouldn’t go.

Delsanra had asked me to eat with them, and food would be sent for Charlotte. I had refused and said I’d eat with her as well. That smile on her face as she had agreed was exactly like Sienna’s.

Speaking of Sienna, I had requested no one tell anyone yet that we were mates. Skyla said she wouldn’t, Royce had nodded, and Ahren, well… he simply gave me a look and said, “I don’t gossip.”

He fucking does.

I now walk down the huge corridor to Charlotte’s room. This place is way too big; I don’t even know why they need the hallway to be four metres wide.

Waste of space.

I stop outside her door and knock; no answer.

I frown and knock again, then I try the handle; it opens. I step inside only to realise the room is empty.

But her scent lingers; before I can even panic that maybe she upped and left, the bathroom door opens, and a waft of steam fills the room. Charlotte steps into the room wearing nothing but a towel.

I stop breathing.

Completely.

She freezes too, with one hand on the doorframe, damp hair falling over her shoulder in loose, wet waves, her skin flushed from the heat of the shower, and the tiny towel only partially covering her breasts and barely reaching mid-thigh. My mind goes blank as I watch water trickle down her smooth, supple skin and swallow hard.

I should say something that isn’t about how much I want to pin her to the bed and- fucking hell.

I growl in frustration and glance up at her standing there with bare legs and wet hair. Then, as if something snaps her back to reality, she blinks, her grey eyes widening for one small second before she seems to remember who she is and looks at me with the air of a woman who doesn’t care about the effect she’s having on me.

“Ares,” she says, clearing her throat.

I look at her face, my gaze dipping to her lips, then my control fails, and my attention falls to her breasts again.

“Westwood.”

My eyes flick to hers, and she watches me with narrowed eyes.

I blink and massage the back of my neck, trying to remember what I’m doing.

“Oh yeah, erm, you didn’t answer; I knocked,” I say.

“You could have waited outside,” she says, one hand loosely wrapping around herself as she holds her towel to her chest.

“Yeah, I did wait,” I reply, my eyes trailing over her again, and this time her cheeks tinge pink. She knows I’m watching her, and yet she doesn’t hide.

“For what? Half a second?” she asks dryly, raising an eyebrow.

“Long enough.”

“For you, perhaps.”

I shut the door behind me, and her gaze flicks to it, then back to me. The air in the room changes, the tension between us almost visible. She swallows, and I almost smirk, but the only reason I do not cross the room in one movement and pin her against the bathroom door is because she is still healing; that doesn’t stop my eyes from trailing over her again. I can appreciate her.

“Eyes up here, Westwood,” she says.